But what about Frank the Clown, according to his appearance on Straight Shoot, he just has really great luck getting front row seats to every show in the mid-west! And they are affordable, especially for a dude claiming to be a waiter/actor! Definitely not paid to be there!

Paul Heyman is entering the endgame of an elaborate plan to take over the WWE that started in early 2013. Let me explain:

The alliance between HHH and Heyman may seem strange at first, but this is a calculated maneuver that Heyman has been planning for well over a year. His goal is to not only be in control of a unified champion, but to oust the Authority as the lead faction in the company.

1) Heyman chooses Brock Lesnar as his instrument, but knows HHH/Vince/etc will never endorse Lesnar as their corporate champion unless they are desperate.

2) Lesnar needs a singular distinction that shows that he is more reliable and formidable than any other superstar. That distinction is beating the Undertaker’s streak.

3) Heyman scouts the Undertaker a full year ahead of time by pitting C.M. Punk against him. Heyman gets a ringside seat to study the Undertaker.

4) Heyman unleashes the Shield against the Undertaker, seriously injuring him and preventing a full recovery before next year’s Wrestlemania.

4) Heyman pits Lesnar against C.M. Punk to condition Lesnar against the Undertaker’s last opponent and compensate where C.M. Punk failed.

6) Heyman taps Cesaro as his new enforcer, and also a reason for Heyman to regularly appear without Lesnar while repeating the Lesnar’s Singular Distinction.

7) Heyman and Cesaro mysteriously stop associating with one another shortly before Battleground.

8) Cesaro mysteriously offers his help to HHH as a new enforcer, undermining Seth Rollins’ position in the faction.

7) Heyman waits until the Authority are truly desperate for a challenger to Cena and graciously offers his champion Lesnar, a superstar literally like no other.

My theory: Cesaro is Heyman’s inside man during this tenuous alliance with the Authority. If Lesnar wins, Cesaro will prevent Rollins from cashing in his briefcase, and both Paul Heyman Guys will wait until the opportunity is right to trash HHH and buy the allegiance of Randy Orton and whatever other cowardly heels would rather side with the new, scarier game in town.

Heck, I wouldn’t be surprised if Heyman was the one who actually called the cops on Steph, or at least put the idea in Brie’s head. Divide and conquer.

Heck, Seth Rollins could have cut a deal with Heyman (his former employer) too, which better explains his weird siding with the Authority. There may come a day when both Rollins and Cesaro just wink and each other and just unload on Triple H backstage.

Or, you know, it could be that Heyman has a part-time schedule limited to TV/PPV events, and since he’ll never be everywhere Cesaro is, they just decided to ditch the angle.

That comment is mostly for Brandon. You’d think someone “in the business” would know that sometimes shite happens for backstage reasons. Given Heyman’s limited availability, WWE really should have never put those two together in the first place.

Love your ideas, Aaron. Hearing Heyman do a promo on this would total amazeballs.

@Goat Faced Killer How is Heyman a part time guy? He’s been on TV pretty consistently for the better part of two years. He’s been involved in three of the past 5 ‘mania main events. He’s on Raw every single Monday this year. He does outside media as a WWE employee. He’s got a DVD documentary coming out in a few weeks and he’ll absolutely be around to promote that.

Heyman’s been on TV more this year than The Miz, or AJ Lee, just to name two full time employees.

Dr. CAW, I’m just going by what I’ve heard Heyman say on podcasts with Austin and Jericho. He doesn’t do all the RAWs, he rarely appears on Smackdown, and he never does house shows. Basically he wants to be on the road two days a week at most.

Of course it’s only my guess as to why they broke up Heyman and Cesaro, but under the circumstances, it doesn’t seem to make sense to pair him with full-time performers.

You know, Cesaro’s offer to the Authority last night made me think about how much I wish he could’ve been the Authority’s mercenary muscle the entire time instead of Kane. I mean, he’s just as believable as the mega-strong guy who will mess you up, has the perfect voice for being a badass hit-man, and can carry matches far better than Kan can.

There’s deserves in the sense that “the consequences of this action were so obvious that while violence is not an acceptable solution, you just did a thing that you knew was going to end in violence and while I’m not going to hit you, I might laugh while somebody else does”.

Maybe I’m being overly sensitive but I hate to see Brandon turn on Bray. While I agree he needs more clear direction/motivation AND a solid PPV outing, I’d much rather keep my support behind him rather than a guy like Rusev.

Everyone’s overlooking the fact that Jericho was found bleeding from his ears after Wyatt cut his promo. I really think they’re going to pull something “supernatural” next show (ie Jericho possessed or cursed).

My only retort to Brandon (and it’s only to one of his points, which makes it a shitty retort indeed) is that Wyatt cared about getting his message out, which made that cage win important. Now that he knows that it’s out, they’re immaterial. Though I still have no idea what his endgame is.

The problem is the same as when Bray first debuted on the main roster. At that time, Bryan wasn’t available, so all he did was beat up Kofi Kingston and R-Truth and of course had nothing to say about it or do anything special. His promo skills and in ring character work were still top notch, as they are now, but he just isn’t doing anything, has no direction and that hurts a guy like Bray tremendously. It’s sad, because I want to see Bray become the new Undertaker (the resident super over mystical guy, not necessarily a mortician-turned-biker-turned-mortician-again), but it just isn’t in the cards right now. I just hope he doesn’t completely get buried, there’s still some amazing talent there.

I want Slater to come out and challenge Flo Rida to a match at Summerslam and then beat the shit out of him but it will never happen because Slater isn’t a big enough name to get to shit kick the celebs. Even minor ones like Flo Rida.

To me the best way to rationalize liking Bray is just to pretend the Cena feud was an elseworld’s story and didn’t really happen. That’s easy to do, since beyond making what Bray’s doing now more boring, it’s had zero impact on anything. If you can ignore that, Bray’s promo last night was pretty decent. He’s better putting himself over than tearing other people down.

I’m assuming/hoping Harper and Rowan are the targets for Xavier’s new crew, because otherwise I have no idea what they do and that seems like a massive waste. My concern over where they and Cesaro will go haunted a ton of the show for me. (to echo Brandon’s point, I’ve been watching old Mania and Hart and Heenan managed damn near every heel, don’t get the need to separate Cesaro and Heyman. )

She must have had a torn pec near the sternum at some point. Either that, or if you have Scott Steiner, Jericho, Kofi Kingston, and Stephanie stand chest-to-chest it will reveal the hidden location of the Ark of the Covenant.

I don’t know if I still have the bad taste from BattleGround in my mouth but I didn’t seee much to like on this Raw.

– First, I’m confused about what Triple H thinks is best for business. He’s got Cena as champ. The all around, clean cut boy scout. What’s the problem? He’d rather have “The Demon” Kane (or I guess now he’s “the devil’s favorite demon) or a guy covered in tattoos. I have nothing against tattoos. I have two full sleeves. But I know for a fact that’s not always “best for business”.

– I don’t get the fascination with Roman Reigns. In my opinion he sucks on the mic and is subpar in the ring. And his faults in the ring really show when he’s not in there with five opponents doing one of his three moves on them over and over again.

– What on earth is the end game for this Steph/Brie angle???

– I’m shocked that Brandon has turned on Bray. I was coming hear to say the same thing and expected backlash. His promos are now just a blathering bunch of nonsense with absolutely no point.

– Bo Dallas is usually my favorite part of the show. I do think he should try thinking of a different finisher. Yeah, I know the Bo-Dawg goes with the “Bo” gimmick but he sucks at doing it.

– It’s good that Lesnar is back but couldn’t he have F-5’d a couple of people?

We don’t see eye to eye at all here.
– First, are you suggesting that Triple H might use the “best for business” line to reach certain end goals even though it’s untrue?
– Roman’s the new Goldberg. I’m enjoying Roman.
– Build heat, use heat to promote matches. The end game is making people care about performers. Brie’s got more interest in her now than she’s ever had in her career.
– Ok fine, we agree.
– That’s BO-lderdash.
– This was the set up. We all want to see Brock crush stuff. It’s why you tune in next week.

My brother thinks the Cosmic Key is a cross-promotion for Guardians of the Galaxy somehow. I don’t really know, I never read the Marvel space-themed comics. Anyway, his theory is the Dust brothers are going to mark out when Batista returns with his new best friend, Raw guest host Chris Pratt.

I’m still in that boat. He’s the best WRESTLER on the roster on the mic (Heyman is obviously the overall best), and his matches are generally extremely enjoyable (though that match with Jericho on Sunday was not what I expected it to be), largely because Bray throws himself so fully into his moves.

At least with Brock, I feel like he can give something big to someone with a loss. (This is, of course, assuming that the eventual story isn’t “John Cena defeats Brock Lesnar at SummerSlam and/or down the road,” which is admittedly never a safe assumption when John Cena is involved.) With The Rock, his returns never amounted to more than short-term interest — we got what are dream matches for a lot of people (not me, personally, but a lot of people nevertheless), but that’s about it.

It never felt right for The Rock to be a part-time champ because he’s theoretically a good guy but only shows up when he has nothing better to do. Brock is basically playing that same guy, but in the alignment it should be — a heel. He’s that asshole who doesn’t give a shit about the fans and wants to win the title and show up only when WWE pays him enough to. Beating THAT guy — assuming, again, that Lesnar isn’t just going to get fed to Cena at SummerSlam or a different show — is enough to give a big boost to someone, because they’re beating that asshole bully who’s hoarding the title. I feel like that’s something that at least has more long-term benefit for WWE and the fans.

I actually like the precedent set here, and wish more big names would be scheduled as part-timers. Whenever someone like Undertaker or Lesnar is scheduled for a match, people take notice, because something interesting is about to go down. Meanwhile, if Undertaker was on TV every week, we’d dislike him as much as Kane.

These guys work crazy hours, and the end result is that by the time you’re a big name, everyone has seen you wrestle two times a week for the last ten years. Let big-name wrestlers who aren’t doing anything interesting become part-timers, and suddenly people like Kane can show up out of the blue, demolish everyone in the ring, and be a believable threat again.

@James M. Lane While I somewhat agree with you, the other edge to that sword is that it makes your full-time guys look weaker when you bring in one of those larger than life part-timers. How do you build anyone in your full time roster up to get to that status is the question, and it seems WWE just can’t get out of their own way when it comes to “making stars”.

The people know who they want; Cesaro, Dolph, to name a few, but for whatever reason, the office seems to start and stop with all of them.

@DoctorCAW I get what you are saying and agree for the most part about how it makes your full-timers look weak. In a perfect world we’d get Cesaro, Ambrose, Dolph, etc. being built into big time stars, and not have ridiculously out of shape Batista come in and immediately get handed a main event slot at ‘Mania. On general principle I’m a proud member of the “don’t give prime PPV spots to part-timers” bandwagon. Brock, however, is the exception to the rule. Brock is a monster in (weird giant baby) human skin. Brock is the best monster heel in the business right now. Hopefully he beats Cena and thrashes all comers for months on end until Daniel Bryan is ready to come back and take the belts from him.

@muddywilbury oh, yeah, we’re absolutely on the same page regarding the Prime PPV spots, and yes, Lesnar is excluded from that “part-timer” group for me because 1) I’m a hypocrite, especially when it comes to people I like, and 2) like you said, he’s the best, most believable heel in the business. I’m just always wondering (and hopeful) that WWE will finally bridge the gap and make the Cesaros, Zigglers, and Ambroses legitimate players for years to come. Ambrose seems safe so far, but the other two have been started and stopped so much these past few years it’s almost believable that the office is purposely trying to sabotage them, even though that can’t be the true reality of the situation, can it? It’s just something I think about when the part time debate comes up.

1) I’m so happy we’re finally going to see Kofi go heel. The possibilities for the new stable is endless. Alicia and Naomi joining would be radical. And I’ll be all for this if this leads to Big E needing five to beat his opponents. Especially if this will lead to Big E as our new heavyweight champ in about a year and a half or two years as a major face.

When I first read this, I thought you were going to like the arrest. You had me worried there for a second. . . unless you were being sarcastic and I didn’t pick up your tone? Either way, the Bellas are seemingly the worst faces ever.

2) ” I Have Officially Turned On Bray Wyatt”

How could you tell he was turned on? *dodges tomatoes*

3) God I hope Paige is going to be more like Paige in NXT and start cracking skulls.

4) I loved that Ambrose/Cesaro match. That inevitable feud will be even better if Ambrose is the heel. I guess we’ll have to wait a year or two for that.

5) Ziggler AND Ryder won on the same night? I’m afraid for Dolph. Though I kind of hope he becomes the Owen Hart to Big E’s Rock in the NOD.

You know Brandon, I love the blog and all, but you get way too serious sometimes about things, and on this occasion the Steph/Brie one is it. This doesn’t mean I disagree with you, but this is wrestling, it’s fucking stupid and that’s the real heart of it.

Is it just me, or did WWE make a big boner move by not having Cena on last night? Let me explain, say what you will, but on my television the crowd quited down to almost nothing after the big “pop” for Lesnar(as the signs in the audience attested to a lot of people already knowing of course (at the point of the music starting and Brock coming out, Heyman played a great move by holding it up for just that one second wearing the shit eating grin)

But afterwards the crowd died halfway through Paul’s promo, and you could tell Brock knew it, the look on his face said it all……”no one really cares that I, the Beast am going to beat the shit out of Cena”

The crowd was primed, I was primed…….all they had to do was hit Cena’s music just to rattle Lesnar, and the crowd would have come unglued. Missed chance.

and when does someone talk that much shit about Cena, and not have him in your face? WTF?

One of the biggest issues in the last month was doing the same thing over and over again leading up to a PPV. If you have Cena get in Brock’s face now, you don’t get do it next week or the week after and make it fresh. I think you gotta celebrate when the WWE actually demonstrates restraint.

+1 Dids. One of the biggest issues facing the WWE over the past couple of months has been the most entertaining show (including PPV’s) they’ve put out has usually been the show that comes after the PPV. It’s tough to build momentum that way.

For all the good promos Heyman has delivered over the past year, last night’s was the worst. He directed it solely at 8-9 year old boys who can’t remember a match that took place two years ago. I have no reason to expect anything different than LOLCenaWins

What I liked about last night’s RAW:
Triple H; Cesaro & Ambrose in the main event; Paige’s heel turn and the fact that we got a tag match with four talented wrestlers; Ryder’s disbelief that he won; Bo and Sandow always; Paul Heyman being awesome; the idea that Black wrestlers might actually start to win some matches.

What I didn’t like about last night’s RAW:
Brie being the most unconvincing person on Earth when she has to act; Alicia Fox having to be involved in that stupid match; Khali was on my TV; I hate Xavier Woods and not fond of Kofi so I hope Big E will make me like them by proxy sort of how I liked Reigns just because he was in a team with Ambrose and Rollins; FLO-RIDA.

Yeah I was thinking that being in a Tree of Woe against Cesaro is the last place you want to be, but in the middle of the ring is probably the worst place since he has room to do anything he wants to you.

Ambrose isn’t Chaotic Neutral, he’s 100% Chaotic Evil. Being pointed at another evil target doesn’t shift him towards good. To wit, a paladin might like a CE demon going after a LE devil, but he won’t think the demon less evil merely because they share a common foe.

See, e.g., Ambrose happily allowing Orton & Kane to beat down Cena or Reigns, but if Rollins shows up with that briefcase, Dean appears with daggers in his eyes. It may also explain why Reigns and Cena made no effort to help Dean during the backstage attack, and why Dean doesnt play catchphrase pissing contest (the WWE interpretation of good) and instead wants to refocus his allies on hurting their shared enemy.

Let me put my nerd goggles on for this. I disagree with your assertion that Ambrose has to be CE. CE people don’t tend to work well with groups much less be the defacto leader of the most dominant faction in recent memory (before HHH and Rollins retconned who the leader was). A CN person, on the other hand, would have no problems working with a group as long as the team’s goals align with his/her own. The ending of the Ambrose/Cesaro match was fitting for a CN. He got bored and ended it. Had he continued to beat Cesaro into oblivion with the chair that would have been CE. A CN person wouldn’t feel compelled to help save Cena and Reigns considering they haven’t exactly gone out of their way to help him. While we are on the subject, Rollins is the epitome of Neutral Evil, and HHH is the epitome of Lawful Evil. Orton is NE. Cesaro is NE. Heyman is LE. Barrrock is CE. I’m not sure where to put Reigns. He is supposed to be Neutral Good but acts more true Neutral. The Demon Kane is (supposedly) CE. Cena is supposed to be Lawful Good but is probably NG at best. Thank you for reading the latest installment of “Muddy Nerds Out over D&D.”

You are totally, 100% wrong about the Brie Bella-Stephanie McMahon situation. I’ll try not to turn this into a 1000-word thing.

Brie Bella didn’t quit just to help Daniel Bryan keep the title. She also quit because she wanted to support her husband and refused to be held hostage. Bryan relinquishing the title doesn’t nullify the other reasons for quitting. This is the story they’re telling, and I think it works. (By the way, Brie quit and slapped Stephanie in the span of two seconds. There’s no super-special legal distinction IRL if the order is reversed unless you’re using WWE un-logic. )

Stephanie is an awful person. Brie should expect Stephanie to keep doing awful things to Nikki because Stephanie is an awful person. Does that mean Brie shouldn’t be allowed to say hello backstage or buy a ringside ticket, or Nikki tweet support for Brie? You’re shifting the responsibility from the awful person who does awful things to Brie because… you prefer a evil person who’s acting stupid to sisters supporting each other?

The Brie-Stephanie confrontation is all escalation. Brie is at ringside, hugging her sister, doing nothing wrong. Stephanie comes out and talks crap to Brie; Brie calls her a bitch. Stephanie asks “what did you call me? and which leads Brie to take the microphone and talk crap back. Stephanie takes it back and slaps Brie; Brie lunges at Stephanie and misses, then it’s over. Again, escalation.

The idea that wrestlers have carte blanche to beat up fans who take their microphone is crap. Stephanie would have been TOTALLY JUSTIFIED in having security throw Brie out of the building. She started to then stopped, because she was acting stupid. Even if it were okay to hit the fan, doing horrible things to audience member’s family and initiating contact is worse than taking the microphone from the wrestler’s hands.

By siccing the police on Brie is getting revenge for herself and Nikki. This is obvious unless someone is playing devil’s advocate. Nobody wants a return to WCW and throwing crap in the ring; stop being dumb about things because you’ve ring announced a few shows.

Ya, great post by Aziraphale. And let’s be honest — they’ve recycled this “arrest” angle a few times since Austin-McMahon back when. It’s never made iron-clad logical or legal sense, but wrestling is like that.

I’ll put it down to say that I simply don’t like Brie and I really like Steph. I want Steph to knock Brie’s block off because Brie is annoying while Steph does funny dances. Maybe Brandon feels the same way, but he’s got a column to write and i don’t.

I had several issues with the Brie/Stephanie stuff as well, mostly from a legal perspective (the bar is in a week, that’s where my brain is right now). First off, the whole “oh, you have a ticket” thing is stupid. Look on the back of any ticket you’ve ever had, and I guarantee it will contain the words “revocable license.” That means it can go away at any time. Stephanie doesn’t like Brie at ringside? Poof, she’s gone.

Next, the arrest of Stephanie. There were a few problems with this. First, right before Stephanie got put into the police car, she yelled that it was self-defense. She has a colorable claim there. When Brie snatched the mic out of Stephanie’s hand SHE committed a battery on Stephanie. Brie could argue that it took too long for Stephanie’s slap to really still be self-defense, but they should have cuffed Brie as well. Second, this sort of angle tends to lead to all sorts of questions and holes. Like why wasn’t Flo Rida arrested for doing far worse to Heath Slater?

It all just came off very poorly to me, and violated both legal reasoning and WWE’s internal logic.

The WWE’s often said “If you buy a ticket you have the right to express an opinion.” They actually have to revoke the license at some point for that argument to hold any water. Based on the WWE’s internal logic (and oft stated policy) this was actually pretty normal.

I think you’ve severely undersold how much time there was between the mic snatch and he slap. Also, police and prosecutorial discretion play a pretty big roll in who gets arrested. For instance, if you’ve already engineered a plan to break my spouses neck and are now setting my sister up to get beat up every week, I think there’s a possibility of the police electing not to arrest me when I take your megaphone away from you while you are yelling at me.

“Next, the arrest of Stephanie. There were a few problems with this. First, right before Stephanie got put into the police car, she yelled that it was self-defense. She has a colorable claim there.”

She may have a claim, but that is to be sorted out in court later, not during the decision to arrest. She admitted to hitting Brie to the police. Thus, probable cause for arrest, which occurred well before she was put into the car and claimed such (still probably wouldn’t make a difference towards the decision to arrest at that point). She was also (I think I heard Renee or Cole say) charged with resisting arrest, which the self defense thing at the time would have little bearing on being arrested. (Granted I was just happy with the Mirandizing and battery charge and not assault)

You might be a bit too down the rabbar hole and missing some forest/trees stuff, but good luck with the bar exam!

About the whole Bray thing… isn’t “randomly picking and choosing what to believe in” what Bible thumpers and cults do? If Bray loses a big match, whatever, wins and losses aren’t a big deal. If he ends up losing “the war”, no matter, he’s the eater of worlds, he’s bigger than all of our petty wars. It sucks to watch him say shit and lose anyway, but it makes sense for his character. Although if they plan on always making him lose, they should at least have him start recruiting to keep the crowd’s interest.

Wait a second, Brandon just wrote a page on why Stephanie was the good person in the feud without dwelling on the word “Bitch” for a paragraph and it’s a commentator making the unnecessary rape connection? The world is getting weird.

So, I comment here on the B&W every once in a while (I’m the guy who compared John Cena’s photoshop promo to Michael Scott doing improv theater) and I guess I’ll have to change my screen name, because I really don’t want to be associated with comments suffering from the logical infirmities and facile misreadings evident in the one above from the Other Wrestling Internet Blog Commenter Who Uses A Caddyshack Pseudonym. Any suggestions for a new name?

The Miz totally did the Figure Four right. It hurts the straight leg by hyper-extending the knee. He worked the left leg a bit and then bent the right one over it. . . Oh shit, I’m defending the Miz. I feel so dirty. The dirt won’t come off. Gah!

One thing Brandon. FLO RIDA DOESN’T DO DISCO, FOR FUCKS SAKE YOU KEEP ON MAKING THE SAME FUCKING MISTAKE FLO RIDA MAKES PITBULL RAP NOT DISCO AS A FAN OF DISCO YOU SHOULD HAND ME YOUR RENAISSANCE CARD RIGHT NOW AND I KNOW YOU HAVE ONE SEEING AS YOU ARE A CAUCASIAN KNIGHT. Secondly, the hell did I reach the Top 10?

I still think Brie comes of as reasonably likeable in the situation since it is implied, and proven in social media, that she stays at home tending to her injured husband, and part of her frustation is that Steph is tormenting her mostly sister now that she can’t torment Brie or Daniel Bryan.

Im not sure Wwe is really worried about the backlash of a prorussian Lana, as they can didn’t really step over the line and at worst can make a meta-video like they did with Zeb Colter and Jack Swagger. I.e. explain that this isn’t real life but a storytelling.

I think Fandango tried to both have his cake and eat it too, and the girls want to punish him for it until he apologizes. I would think you’ld enjoy a heel get his comeuppance for treating women as props and objects, Brandon?

Roman Reigns is fully aware that Ambrose is a certified looney whose sole purpose now is making Rollins life a living hell, so he probably realizes he doesn’t really have to get involved and rather can consentrate on trying to win the title.

On the Fandango thing, it would be fine if that was the point if someone made it clear that they want a proper apology. Even if they want to do the “women won’t tell you what they want” cliche and just have someone else suggest he apologize to them. Right now they just seem to be doing it because they enjoy it, not because they want an apology.

But if there was a backstage segment of just SummerLay talking about how angry/hurt they are and how they want an apology, it would make sense. I’m just saying that it can’t be used as a justification because no one has acknowledged that. Not even Cole on commentary and he beats every story to death.

I know it’s just wrastlin’, but do characters always have to clearly state their motivations for everything? Granted, you’re right that they normally do exactly that and then have Cole repeat it ad nauseum while pimping the network and app. Fandango hurt them both and has yet to apologize for anything he’s done, and it’s perfectly in character for him not to realize that.

I don’t mean to say you are wrong, either of you. In fact, I wish they didn’t say it and Fandango just did it at Summerslam after weeks of losing to make it retroactively okay (assuming that ends it). All I mean is that would be shockingly subtle, ESPECIALLY for WWE who, as we all know, beat you over the head with everything.

I stand by the bellas for the sheer fact that they’re the good guys and Stephenie McMahon is the bad guy despite any evidence to the contrary. Stephenie’s wrong by the very nature of her role in the situation.

JR’s been talking about interesting things on his podcasts lately. One of his favourite go-to’s is how it’s difficult for heels to get heat if the rules aren’t enforced. Closed fists are on his favourites.

What I’m getting at is this: If heels can’t go over by breaking the rules, who’s left to hate? My inclination is to say it’s the people making the rules.

Battleground somehow got more Bests and higher percentage of Bests than last night’s RAW. That’s odd considering Battleground consisted of 1 great match, 2 good matches, zero plot advancement, and a 50 lb bag of horse manure while RAW had Baaaarrooock, 2 great matches, 2 good matches, tons of plot advancement, and a much smaller bag of horse manure.

No one is saying their feelings are hurt, at least I’m not. Just pointing out the futility of trying to go by the text in bold when reading these Best and Worsts columns. No reasonable, objective fan is going to think RAW was worse than Battleground. *SPOILER ALERT* People tend to write with more passion about things they hate than things they love, especially on the Internet. Case in point–the first page of the report is 1300+ words of well crafted venom before a sarcastic best is thrown at the horrible, overacting plant. There’s no mention of HHH’s IWC trollin’ promo (which could have been the best promo of the night if not for Heyman), and that’s fine. I don’t have to agree with everything you write to still enjoy your column.

In fairness, what real revenge has Dean truly wrought on Seth? He’s kept him from cashing in a couple of times and brawled with him a little before immediately having the fight broken up. They haven’t even had a true match yet. Also, Seth has attacked Dean and successfully beat Dean down more often than Dean has succeeded in his attacks against Seth. Unlike Fandango who is no longer actively doing anything to hurt SummerLay, Seth is still actively fucking with Dean.

Not only are they still going at each other, but its part of Dean’s character that he is off his rocker and has a major grudge. He isn’t really a babyface in the typical sense but more of an Austin-esque “do whatever I want” guy that the crowd happens to be behind. Its not black and white, and Ambrose takes us straight to the grey area.

yeah, Dean actually declared that he was going to prevent Seth from doing a thing that Seth has a year to do. So it makes sense in the story. It’s not just someone arbitrarily beating up a person they don’t like all year.

-I can’t believe you didn’t give a Best to HHH’s promo to open the show. I was in stitches. “Me and my friend Mark, WE’RE GONNA STOP WATCHING!”

-“Hey Damien, hang on to that LeBron jersey, you’re going to need it again in a year.” I love you for saying this even though I wish I believed it were true. Maybe in 4-5 years once he’s won a title for Cleveland and wants to chase Jordan.

-For me, Miz/Ziggler was easily the best match on the show. Cesaro/Ambrose was great but it was pretty slow and somewhat disappointing to me. It was slow for a reason and I appreciate that, but these guys are capable of way more than they put into this match, even for a match on Raw. I loved the suplex to the floor and the springboard into the uppercut but otherwise it dragged a bit for my tastes.

-This is my buddy during the entire Flo Rida performance: [twitter.com]
Except minus the face. He just sat there listless, holding this up and it was one of my top three favorite things that happened all night. It was part 1 of a three-part “BOO-ROCK LESNAR” sign but he used it more for this than anything.

-As much as I want to hate Lesnar for barely ever being on the show, I have to agree that I like having him around. Plus being in the building for the pop he got was a pretty special moment. There’s no reason Brock and Cena can’t have a 4-star match at SummerSlam, plus we’ll finally get Ambrose/Rollins and maybe a decent Wyatt/Jericho match. Is this what Stockholm Syndrome feels like?

OK, just went back and watched Cesaro/Ambrose again. I think most of the boring parts happened during the commercials. Also there’s a lot about this match that didn’t really translate well live. And right when it really got going, it ended in a DQ. I still think Miz/Ziggler was better but this was better than I remember.

Kinda shocked that you didn’t bring up Jerry completely changing the ending of swagger v rusev on the pre match recap. It went from a count out victory to a tap out. Just amazing to me that not only did he blatantly sound l like he had forgotten what had happened, but that no one seemed to notice.

Supplemental Worst: Uproxx on a mobile not showing this, the HBK, and wrestling game articles for the last 9 or so hours since the wrestler dressing bit. Maybe it’s my phone, but …. yea.

Aside from that, I kind of agree, kind of disagree with the Brie/Steph thing. The first part I agree with, the arrest stuff I somewhat disagree. Say what you will of the Brie slapping and not getting arrested vs Steph’s “arrest, I think the actual performance of the arrest was one of the best I’ve seen and at least it wasnt some put this person in handcuffs so I can beat them down, like what they did with DBry. They Mirandized (I don’t remember any other time they did this, but maybe they did). They called it a battery for the crime instead of the oft misused “assault”. Plus, there were some other minor details they often overlook that made it better, at least to me. But that seems to be more of an overall problem they seem to run into, making sure the details are spot on while missing a glaring big point vs hitting a glaring big point but overlooking the details that cause the hit to be a double instead of a homer. Can’t please everyone all the time and such, I guess, but creative’s balance seems way off on that issue.

HHH’s hybrid line and the whole thing of well “I gotta go she’s in jail” (while anyone with sense, is like she’s still in the car…) then turns to “well, she gotta be processed, and the lawyers are there, what can i really do?” bit was pretty good.

I’m almost positive at this point that DiscoInferno is doing one of those troll initiation things and is purposely trying to get banned to prove himself to the other trolls. Maybe he’s doing it so he can write an exclusive on trolling like Neil Sampat in The Newsroom.

My main problem with the whole Brie vs Steph thing is almost the same as it was during the whole Bryan vs Steph thing. The way faces act and the content of the promos make them unlikable to me. It seems like both Brie and Bryan could’ve made solid point on why Steph is full of it, but instead they chose to build their entire promos around “BITCH” and that’s it. They call her a bitch and then wait for the crowd to go all “OOHHHH” just like that guy in the gif, then they YES a bit. There’s a good story to be told there, but I think the way WWE writes from point A to point B to point C etc. is horrible and makes everyone look bad.

Triple H, as some have praised, disputably tied the best part of my night; the other one was (of course) BUHRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOCK LLLLLLLLLLLLESNAR!!! I was pretty much mentally begging for WWE to give him to m-er, the viewers by the time the final segment began.